


This Winter's Night

by Vaysh



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Divorce mentioned, Inspired by Music, M/M, Malfoy Manor, Minor Character Death Mentioned (Narcissa Malfoy), Mutual Pining, Number Twelve Grimmauld Place, Older Characters, Past Ginny Weasley/Harry Potter, Pining, The Broken Orbs from the Hall of Prophecy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-15
Updated: 2019-01-15
Packaged: 2019-10-10 05:11:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,530
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17419700
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vaysh/pseuds/Vaysh
Summary: You don't need to hear a prophecy for it to become true.





	This Winter's Night

**Author's Note:**

  * For [rillalicious](https://archiveofourown.org/users/rillalicious/gifts).



> This fic was written to the soundtrack of Gordon Lightfood's [Song for a Winter's Night](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LfyDs6uXww0), one of the most beautiful winter songs I know. Thank you, Rillalicious, for reminding me of it, and giving me the opportunity to write a fic inspired by it. Have a wonderful New Year 2019.
> 
> I cannot thank Bixgirl enough for her brilliant, lightning-fast beta. You simply rock!

☆

The lamp is burning low upon my table top.  
The snow is softly falling.  
The air is still within the silence of my room.  
I hear your voice softly calling.  


from: "Song for a Winter's Night"

☆

The large owl flew off into the sky; soon it was only a dark speck before the pink of the setting sun. Draco closed the door of the owl house and turned to the garden path. The Owl had been the last chore of the day, a donation to a small charity that organised a soup kitchen for the indigent on Christmas Eve. Draco donated to them for the first time in years, on a whim, because Potter's youngest had accosted him in Diagon Alley and asked for his support. 

In the minutes since the sun had set, the temperatures had dropped noticeably. Draco had come out without his gloves, and he pushed his hands into the pockets of his cloak. Sundown usually marked the end of his customary evening walk. But he was late today, what with the stupid bird who had struggled forever before he finally allowed Draco to attach the heavy bag of Galleons to his leg. He walked briskly now, past the glass front of the Manor's winter garden and past Mother's roses. His breath made soft clouds in the air; the estate lay in deep quiet. The moon had not yet risen, and nightfall cast a grey blanket over the flower beds, the rolling meadows, and – further in the distance – the woods. 

There was a new book on Divination waiting on his desk, and Hanny surely had kept the fire burning. Draco's favourite place in the large chair before the fire would be warm and comfortable when he returned inside. He would have a glass of sherry before supper, and he would study the foreword of the book. But not yet. Draco looked over to the Manor looming from the snowy darkness. There was no light in his study, and when he glanced up to the windows of Mother's old rooms, they were wrapped in darkness, too. The only light came from the kitchens, a shimmer at the basement of the house.

He walked the pebbled path that ran in soft slopes all the way to the groundskeeper's cottage and returned in a wide half-circle to the Manor House. Perhaps he should check the stables where the peacocks and peahens had been housed when Father had still lived here. But Lucius Malfoy had made his second home in Croatia, amidst a colony of pureblood exiles who kept to the old ways and would not come back to Wizarding England as long as Granger was Minister of Magic. Seeing the changes she and Potter achieved, and the way the world actually changed because of them, Draco doubted his father and his cronies would ever return to England. Not that he was bothered by it. He saw Father twice a year when he visited the Continent, and that was more than enough time he ever wished to spend with him.

Mother, though... Draco could not look at the frozen stalks of her flowers without missing her deeply. She was buried near Paris, in a small cemetery with white roses blooming on her grave, as had been her wish. 

Which left Draco the Manor, the huge estate, and a hobby which required little human interaction apart from the occasional visit to Knockturn Alley. There were weeks when the groundskeeper and the house-elves were the only living creatures he talked to. And the bloody owls, of course. Draco passed the pond where, in the summer, bright-coloured koi lived. Now it was frozen, a treacherous night-blue surface where moonlight could play tricks on a wanderer's eye. The koi pond marked the half-way point towards the cottage, and Draco walked on, digging his hands even deeper into the cloak. 

For a while he had thought Astoria Greengrass might take Narcissa's place, help him run the Estate, and continue the Malfoy line. But times were changing indeed. Before the war, women like Astoria from the old circles may have considered marrying a gay man and being his beard. Not anymore. Astoria liked him well enough, Draco thought, but she was running the first Wizarding fashion label on her own, and she was happily in love with a Muggle designer from Milan.

Snowflakes fell on his hair. Draco's hat sat safely upon his gloves in the Manor's entrance hall. He had not expected it to be so cold tonight. When he looked up into the sky, the snow was coming down thickly, settling on the path before him. For a moment he could imagine that the looming shadow before him was Hogwarts, and the path thickly covered in the deep snow of a Scottish winter. For a moment he could almost feel the warmth of the butterbeer from the Broomsticks, and the boy at his side holding his hand...

Draco sighed. Best not go there, not even in his thoughts, not alone in the gardens on a winter's night. It had been the best year of his life, their magical eighth year at Hogwarts, the first year of peace, after the Dark Lord was truly dead and gone. But it had been a very long time ago. Harry was married, he was a father; Draco had been stunned when he saw Harry's youngest son, Albus – the spitting image of Harry at age seventeen. Draco wondered, every day, how Harry was doing and whether he had found true happiness. He'd go and see him if he only knew, within his heart, that Harry would welcome such a visit. There had been rumours lately... But best not go there. Even Pansy said to leave the past behind. 

When he approached the Manor, the window of his study shone warm and welcoming into the night. One of the house-elves must have lighted the candles in the room.

Hanny stood in the open door, underneath a wreath of bluebell flowers that the elves put up for Yule each year. The elf's familiar wrinkled face was awash in the silvery glow, and Draco felt a rush of affection for the creature. 

'Hanny –' he started.

'Master Draco...'

Draco smiled at Hanny, waiting for him to continue. But the elf's face fell and he bowed so deeply that his bald head touched the stairs. Internally, Draco cursed Father who had put an unnatural fear of wizards into the house-elves serving at the Manor. Yes, Hanny had spoken out of turn and interrupted him, but who bloody cared!

'Please stand. You're going to catch a cold on those freezing stairs.'

The elf straightened immediately but the bluebell lights wavered. Hanny had his long ears pressed to his head, and shivered with just a tea cosy around his waist. Draco promised himself to gift the house-elves with flannel pillowcases for Christmas.

'I just meant to thank you for lighting the study while I was taking my walk.'

'Yes, Master Draco.' Hanny still stood as if he expected to be punished. Damn Father and his casual cruelty towards the family's elves.

Draco walked up the steps, past the elf and into the entrance hall. The Manor's magic made the chandelier at the ceiling light up the moment a Malfoy entered the house. Hanny followed him, which had been Draco's intent. Lure him back into the warmth. 'And?' 

'Supper's almost ready, Master Draco.' Hanny bowed very stiffly. 'It will be served in the study, as by your orders.'

Draco sighed inwardly. There had been something else, he was sure of it, something that Hanny had been eager to tell him. The hall looked as it always did at Yuletide: the large tree in the corner, the bannister decorated with silver ribbons, white poinsettia on every stair, all the way to the upper floor. His hat and gloves were still lying on the table, and there –

'An owl arrived while Master Draco was out in the garden.' Hanny was about to offer him the Owl on the silver tablet, but Draco just took the envelope and handed Hanny his snow-soaked cloak instead. 

'I'll be in the study. Please serve supper when the kitchen is ready.'

He left Hanny standing open-mouthed in the hall, and maybe, Draco was not quite sure, with a small smile on his wrinkled face.

The fire in the study was blazing; his favourite blanket lay folded on the chair. _Vaticination: Magic Tumultuous_ was waiting for him to delve into before supper. Draco pulled off his boots, kicked them under the side table, and sat in his reading chair. 

The Owl was from the charity – a note thanking him for his donation, with the picture of a cauldron full of steaming soup. A warm feeling settled in Draco's chest. It had been the right thing to do. The note ended with an invitation to come by on Christmas Eve for hot soup and company. The soup, Draco was certain, would be no match to what the kitchen elves served him tonight. But as he moved his fingertips over Harry Potter's scrawl of a signature, Draco thought he might just go, for the company.

☆

The candle died with a small hiss; smoke curled softly towards the ceiling. Harry looked up. The glass shards on the desk before him were cast in sudden darkness. He had been working on the broken orb for the better part of the night. Only now did he notice that the flames in the old-fashioned fireplace had died down. There were ice-flowers growing along the window frame; the trees in the small park outside were covered with snow. As Harry stared out the window, the grey light of early morning peeked over the roofs of Grimmauld Square.

_Ginny had left him._

Once, even the thought had been unthinkable. And yet here it was, hiding bitter words like divorce, custody, alimony. With the thought came a feeling of relief Harry could only admit to himself in moments like this, after having been up all night, absorbed in a task that allowed him to relax his mind. A night of peace. But now, with the morning light, the thought returned. Ginny, who knew him better than anyone else, was right: Harry loved her as a friend, a steady companion, he loved her for the kids. But not as a wife, not as a lover. Her unhappiness, his silence, their failed, shameful attempts to continue within the bedroom what they presented outside of it to the world – Ginny had finally put an end to it. 

She had moved her belongings to the Burrow and left England. This winter she was working in Asia and Australia, reporting from the Oceanic-Asian Quidditch League. As for Harry, the Minister herself had told him to take time off from the Auror Department – take an extended holiday, longer than just over Christmas and New Year's. Hermione had told him in no uncertain terms that she did not want to see him in the Ministry for at least four weeks. 

For the first time ever, Harry had had all the Yule gifts wrapped a fortnight before Christmas; he had the Yuletide Dinner planned, the invitations all sent out. He even had the menu discussed with Kreacher and finally decided on an old-fashioned Wizarding feast – mostly because Kreacher would not budge enough to allow for anything else. All was set and done. And Harry did not know what to do with his long days, much less with his even longer nights.

After breakfast, he always listened to Ginny's broadcasts on the Wireless. He read _so_ many books. But in the afternoons, when it seemed as if even the air stood still in the silent house, he went up to the attic. He inhaled the grassy smell of hippogriff that lingered ever since Buckbeak had been hidden here.

On one side of the attic, a long row of crates sat against the wall. They were filled with thousands and thousands of shards of glass. They were all that was left from the globes in the Hall of Prophecy. This had been Lily's idea. She was working now for the Department of Mysteries, an Unspeakable in Training. There, she had stumbled upon the hastily packed crates and brought them to home. And this winter, to kill the time, Harry had started to puzzle them together. 

The prophecies were gone, spilled on a last breath when the globes were destroyed in the battle in the Ministry thirty years ago. But still Harry felt a certain satisfaction when he found the right pieces and magicked them back together – as if there was a chance that a lost prophecy could be recaptured once its glass receptacle was whole again. 

Meanwhile, Grimmauld Place filled up with brilliant glass balls, its own colourful Advent decoration. Harry fitted the orbs with silk ribbons and hung them into windows, from stair railings and from chandeliers. He had even put up white shelving in an unused room. There, each orb that he (or sometimes Lily) repaired was placed on a soft piece of cloth. Kreacher had sourly taken it upon himself to dust them twice a week.

The orb in front of Harry was almost finished. It was one of the larger ones, with all the fragments accounted for – a rare find. Harry's eyes had grown accustomed to the darkness in the attic, and in the dim light the orb glittered mysteriously. Outside, webs of snow were drifting by the window pane. A shiver ran through Harry. He got up, replaced the candles on the candle-holder and alighted them with a Lumos. There was kindling stacked beside the fireplace, and Harry took one and held it to a glowing log. At once it was engulfed by bluish flames. A few moments later, the fire started crackling.

' _Leviosa!_ ' With his wand, Harry lifted another shard from the desk and placed it onto the fragile rim of the orb. The shard immediately attached itself, somehow melting and re-hardening in the blink of an eye. Harry rubbed his thumb along the place where he should have felt something – a hairline fracture, at least. But the glass was as smooth and clear as if it had never been broken. It was the magic of the globes asserting itself, Lily had told him. It still felt like a wonder to him – something magical all by itself, with no witch or wizard the cause behind it. He had four more pieces to go, and then the orb would be complete. Already, Harry could see wisps of fog gathering in the bottom of it. 

He cast the spell again – ' _Leviosa!_ ' A third time, ' _Leviosa_ ,' and the next pieces slit into place. Almost perfectly. Harry could see it now, as he compared the two remaining shards with the space left for them, right at the top of the sphere, a triangle-shaped splinter was missing. He searched the table but it was spotlessly clean, no dust, no bits of straw, not even tea cup stains or crumbs from supper last night. Kreacher always used a Scouring Charm on the desk before he would allow Harry to work at it. 

Harry got up and picked up the crate which had held the fragments of the globe. He rummaged around straw and left-over wrapping paper; he carefully searched the corners and crevices of the box. Nothing. Then he remembered he was a wizard and reached for his wand.

' _Accio_ shard,' he murmured, projecting in his mind a tiny, three-sided piece of glass, forming a crooked triangle.

From the row of crates came a scratching noise, sounding much like the infestation of mice in the old cellars that Harry and Kreacher had got rid off of last summer. But this sound was coming closer, quite opposite to the mice. It thumped and rumbled in one crate in particular, and before Harry could open it, the top burst open, stripes of tape ripped apart as much as Lily's Sticking Charm. 

Harry caught the flying fragment in his left hand; he could see at a glance that it was the missing piece. Perhaps it had been hidden underneath the collapsing shelves in the Hall of Prophecy; perhaps it had been lost later when Unspeakables gathered up all the many fragments left of the globes. But now it lay in Harry's hand and he gently put it on the desk in front of the almost-finished orb. 

' _Leviosa_ ,' he said, raising his wand and guiding the shard to the small opening. It fit as he had known it would, and when he put the wand away and used a wordless Magnifying Charm to check for cracks, it was as if the globe had never been broken. Inside, a faint fog curled and rose, filling the sphere so it was no longer translucent. It was whole and beautiful; it shimmered silver in the pale glow of the streetlamps on one side, and golden on the other side, reflecting the flames from the fireplace. There was a promise to it, and a sense of completion, and Harry felt a stab of regret – for the lost prophecy as much as for his inability to make things right with...

 _Ginny had left him._ There was the thought again and with it the half-acknowledged feeling of relief. Harry looked up at the old grandfather clock they had brought up here when the kids had been small. It was shortly after eight, early morning still. On a normal day, Ginny's Australian broadcast would start in an hour. But it was Christmas Eve. There hadn't been any games all week, and Harry was supposed to be at the Leaky Cauldron tonight, to help in the soup kitchen Albus had organised.

Perhaps Draco would come. It was a possibility. Harry picked up the small leather bag that had been sitting on the desk all night. After Draco's owl had brought his generous donation, Harry had handed the Galleons to Albus – but the pouch he had kept to himself. He didn't think anyone noticed; only Lily had given him a curious glance.

The bag smelled of owl and lemon wax and Draco. Harry took a deep breath, he buried his face in the leather. How could he have forgotten the distinct but indescribable smell? It was such an old memory, and it came all mixed up with Hogwarts, the end of the war, their magical eighth year, studying potions and runes and falling in love for the first time. Harry took another breath – butterbeer, snow, cold slender hands – and another. If Draco came tonight, he'd talk to him, he'd find the right words. And perhaps...

Harry sighed and got up. Early afternoon, Albus, Lily and James would descend upon the kitchen and cook buckets full of Indian Mulligatawny soup for the homeless. Harry still held the leather bag in his hand and he meant to put it in his trouser pocket. It was too large, though, the leather too unyielding to fit. He put it back onto the desk. Outside, the winter sun filled Grimmauld Square with its pale light. The finished globe sparkled with it. As Harry searched one last time for any fracture lines, he gave the curling fog a last curious glance. Then he left to catch a few hours of sleep.

☆

In the bright morning light, the globe had already been tilting imperceptibly to one side. When the wizard closed the trap door, the bang was enough to set the globe in motion. The wooden desk was old and it had been scoured with too many Scouring Charms. It was far from even but its surface was perfectly smooth. The globe would have rolled towards the middle of the desk and come to standstill a few inches further than where it had set before. But the bag was in its way. The globe barely touched it, but it was enough to redirect its course towards the edge of the desk. 

Nobody watched when it rolled precariously along the edge for a few more inches, then lost its balance and dropped to the floor.

Nobody heard the crash and the subsequent murmur, musical and soft like the webs of snow covering the window sill. 

Nobody was there to see the Seer whose pearly white figure rose from the glass fragments on the floor. Nobody saw the other figure, either, a young pregnant woman whose long hair was more silver than white. 

Nobody recognised the soft, scratchy voice of the Seer; nobody was there to listen to a prophecy that had not been destroyed thirty years ago. For a few moments, the Seer's voice filled the attic of number 12, Grimmauld Place.

> 'Last in line, first to break free,  
>  to love the love that has no name  
>  to sing the song that has no words.  
>  A snake in lightning  
>  saving the one who lives.'

On a last breath, the voice faltered and the figures melted away, into the shadows. Nobody was there to hear the thunderous silence following their departure.

The dusty floor was littered with glittering fragments of glass; on the desk lay an empty leather bag. Outside, the snow was softly falling.

☆ _The End_ ☆

  



End file.
